SALIVA OF THE GILA MONSTER. 201 
Dr. R. W. Shufeldt had a personal encounter with an active Gila Monster, of which he 
wrote : 
“On the 18th inst., in the company of Prof. Gill of the [Smithsonian] Institution, I examined for the 
first time Dr. Burr’s specimen, then in a cage in the herpetological room. It was in capital health, and at 
fust I handled it with great care, holding it in my left hand examining special parts with my right. At 
the close of this examination I was about to return the fellow to his temporary quarters, when my left 
hand slipped slightly, and the now highly indignant and irritated Heloderma made a dart forward and 
seized my right thumb in his mouth, inflicting a severe lacerated wound, sinking the teeth in his upper 
maxilla to the very bone. He loosed his hold immediately and I replaced him in his cage, with far greater 
haste, perhaps, than I removed him from it. 
“« By suction with my mouth, I drew not a little blood from the wound, but the bleeding soon ceased 
entirely, to be followed in a few moments by very severe shooting pains up my arm and down the corre- 
sponding side. The severity of these pains was so unexpected that, added to the nervous shock already 
experienced, no doubt, and a rapid swelling of the parts that now set in, caused me to become so faint as 
to fall, and Dr. Gill’s study was reached with no little difficulty. The action of the skin was greatly 
increased and the perspiration flowed profusely. A small quantity of whiskey was administered. This is 
about a fair statement of the immediate symptoms; the same night the pain allowed of no rest, although the 
hand was kept in ice and laudanum, but the swelling was confined to this member alone, not passing 
beyond the wrist. Next morning this was considerably reduced, and further reduction was assisted by the 
use of a lead-water wash. 
“Tn a few days the wound healed kindly, and in all probability will leave no scar; all other symp- 
toms subsided without treatment, beyond the wearing for about forty-eight hours so much of a kid glove as 
covered the parts involved. 
. ‘' Taking everything into consideration, we must believe the bite of Heloderma suspectum to 
be a harmless one beyond the- ordinary symptoms that usually follow the bite of any irritated animal. I 
have seen, as perhaps all surgeons have, the most serious consequences follow the bite inflicted by an 
angry man, and several years ago the writer had his hand confined in a sling for many weeks from such a 
wound administered by the teeth of a common cat, the even tenor of whose life had been suddenly 
interrupted.”’ 
Only a few months had passed after the publication of Dr. Shufeldt’s article when 
there appeared an account of the first carefully conducted series of experiments with the 
saliva of the Heloderma. This was by Drs. 8. Weir Mitchell and Edward T. Reichert, 
who conclude that : 
“¢ The poison of Heloderma causes no local injury. 
<< That it arrests the heart in diastole, and that the organ afterwards contracts slowly—possibly in 
rapid rigor mortis. 
«« That the cardiac muscle loses its irritability to stimuli at the time it ceases to beat. 
‘That the other muscles and the nerves respond readily to irritants. 
«¢ That the spinal cord has its power annihilated abruptly, and refuses to respond to the most powerful 
electrical currents. 
